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August 6, 2005Playing in PainNot that it physically hurts to pound out a story or two on the keyboard, but I am playing in pain for you today. Yesterday I was doing some research for this blog in the garage when I suffered an injury. In a sense, I "took one for the team." Normally the At Home Mechanic can expect to suffer a skinned knuckle or two in the course of a project. I like to think of the tiny scars on the back of my hands as battle decorations that demonstrate years of devotion to the cause. I will never get a job as a hand model, but that career path was never really an option for me. But yesterday was a new and troubling injury that may signal a change in the way I will work in the garage in the future. I was bending deeply from the waist changing the fuel injectors in my 1987 Honda CRX Si when I felt and heard a "ping" in the lower left quadrant of my back followed by a sharp pain. Barely able to straighten up, I gingerly sat on a straight back chair that I keep in the garage. It took a few minutes for the pain to subside and my blurred vision to clear. I left the car project uncompleted and closed up the garage for the day, that project will have to wait until I regain some mobility. I hobbled back into the house and went straight to the medicine cabinet. Normally an aspirin is the strongest medicine I take, but this pain called for more serious relief. Fortunately the governments of Canada and Great Britain can trust their citizens with something stronger than plain aspirin; they allow the sale of a compound of common pain reliever like Tylenol with a trace amount of Codeine. I keep a box or two on hand at all times specifically for this type of situation. The rest of the day was spent horizontally, waiting for the knot in my back to unravel. I suspect that the problem is muscular rather than spinal and in time the injury will heal. By today I am more stiff than sore and I will take it easy for the next day or so. If there is no improvement in a week, then I will consult a physician. But I am not immobilized and the pain is subsiding. Working on your car is a physical endeavor; you bend, twist, crawl and contort to get at the trouble spot. In the future I will have to be more careful to do some warm up stretches before tackling a car project. And I may have to call upon a helper for assistance for some projects. I had always suspected that there was a reason the wife and I decided to have children. Now I know why. Posted by Scott at August 6, 2005 2:56 PM CommentsOuch! I feel for ya, bud. I went through a series of back spasms many years ago. T3 (Tylenol 3 with codeine!) completely took the pain away, but I had access to a limited supply of them, so I had to talk to a doctor. He gave me muscle relaxants. They worked quite well, and after a couple of days the problem was completely gone. I am told that large doses of ibuprofen (Advil) also work as muscle relaxants/anti-inflammatories. It has been recommended to me in recent years to take three or four pills (the usual 200mg ones) at a time, up to four times per day. Yes, by a doctor. --DD Posted by: Dave Darling at August 6, 2005 5:05 PM Post a comment |
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